Elastic Security Detection Rules

Attempt to Install Root Certificate

Last updated 2 months ago on 2025-03-18
Created 4 years ago on 2021-01-13

About

Adversaries may install a root certificate on a compromised system to avoid warnings when connecting to their command and control servers. Root certificates are used in public key cryptography to identify a root certificate authority (CA). When a root certificate is installed, the system or application will trust certificates in the root's chain of trust that have been signed by the root certificate.
Tags
Domain: EndpointOS: macOSUse Case: Threat DetectionTactic: Defense EvasionData Source: Elastic DefendLanguage: eql
Severity
medium
Risk Score
47
MITRE ATT&CK™

Defense Evasion (TA0005)(opens in a new tab or window)

↳ Subvert Trust Controls (T1553)(opens in a new tab or window)

False Positive Examples
Certain applications may install root certificates for the purpose of inspecting SSL traffic.
License
Elastic License v2(opens in a new tab or window)

Definition

Rule Type
Event Correlation Rule
Integration Pack
Prebuilt Security Detection Rules
Index Patterns
logs-endpoint.events.*
Related Integrations

endpoint(opens in a new tab or window)

Query
process where host.os.type == "macos" and event.type in ("start", "process_started") and
  process.name == "security" and process.args like "add-trusted-cert" and
  (process.parent.name like~ ("osascript", "bash", "sh", "zsh", "Terminal", "Python*") or (process.parent.code_signature.exists == false or process.parent.code_signature.trusted == false))

Install detection rules in Elastic Security

Detect Attempt to Install Root Certificate in the Elastic Security detection engine by installing this rule into your Elastic Stack.

To setup this rule, check out the installation guide for Prebuilt Security Detection Rules(opens in a new tab or window).